How many screenshots does a Steam page need, and which ones?

After the capsule, players look at the screenshots, often in a hover preview in a list before they even open the page. They are asking one question: what do I do in this game? A screenshot that answers it in a second earns the click; one that shows a menu, a logo or a moody landscape with no player in it does not.

The obvious approach is to upload the prettiest frames. The better one is to upload the clearest: frames where a stranger can see the character, the action and the goal at a glance, in the visual style the game actually has. Valve's rules point the same way, and its review sends back pages that do otherwise.

From Valve's Standard Store Graphical Assets documentation:

• At least 5, 1920x1080 or larger, 16:9.
• Gameplay only. No concept art, pre-rendered cinematic stills, awards, marketing copy or written descriptions; menus only if they are a unique part of the game.
• At least 4 marked suitable for all ages, or the game may not appear in some areas of Steam.
• The page background, if you do not upload one, is generated from your last screenshot.
• Localised versions can be uploaded per language.

Valve's review checks that screenshots show gameplay, so concept art among them is a common reason a page comes back.

Five indie games' Steam pages, read through Steam's public store data on 18 October 2026:

Enough to show every kind of thing the player does, and no more. The five pages above span 7 to 16, with a middle around 12, and the count follows the game: a game with one tight loop needs fewer than a game with many systems or places. For most indie games, eight to twelve covers it. Fewer than eight often leaves out something a player would want to see; more than about fifteen are rarely viewed and dilute the strongest ones.

What matters more than the total is the order. The first four or five appear beside the trailer at the top of the page and in hover previews in lists, so they do most of the work. Treat the rest as the gallery for players who are already interested.

1. First: the core loop, at its clearest, with the player character, the action and the setting in one view.
2. Second and third: variety, different places, enemies, systems or moods, so the game reads as more than one screen.
3. One that shows depth: a build, a map, a crafting screen or a skill tree, if that is what the game is about.
4. One that shows the hook: the thing comparable games do not do.
5. Keep the HUD players will see; hiding it misrepresents the game.
6. Cut anything with debug text, placeholder art, empty rooms or text-heavy menus.
7. Check the set at thumbnail size: if two look the same small, drop one.

• Capture at 1920x1080 or above, in 16:9, from the game itself, not scaled up from a smaller window.
• Stage the moment: place the camera, pose the character and time the action the way a photographer would. A staged frame is still real gameplay.
• Use the shipping graphics settings, or say so if a screenshot uses higher settings than the defaults.
• Take many, keep few: capture twenty or thirty and choose the best eight to twelve.
• Replace them as the game improves; outdated screenshots undersell a game that has moved on.
• Keep the originals at full resolution with their capture date, so a later trailer, press kit or festival submission can reuse the same frames.

Valve's documentation notes that screenshots are used beyond the store page, in featured places such as the Steam home page, and players see them in hover previews when browsing lists. That is why the all-ages marking matters: Steam needs safe images it can show to anyone in those places. It is also why every screenshot should stand on its own, without the description beside it: in a hover preview or a feature slot, the image is all the player gets.

If your game has text in its interface and you localize it, upload localized screenshots too, so a player browsing in Japanese or Brazilian Portuguese sees the interface in their language. Screenshots with no interface text serve every language at once.

"Gameplay only" is clear for action games and fuzzier for others. In a narrative game, a dialogue scene is gameplay; in a strategy game, a busy interface may be the game itself. The test is not whether a screenshot is pretty or busy, but whether it shows what a player will see while playing. When in doubt, ask whether the image could be taken by a player in the shipped game. If it could, it belongs.

Flockbay's Steam page takes screenshots from the running game at 1920x1080, five or more, in the order taken, for you to reorder or replace, and exports them in the page's .zip, which you upload yourself. Preparing the page by hand and its .zip are free; drafting is free in beta until 1 December 2026.